Yearly Orcish Pro-Wrestling Tournament
A the occasion of the Flood Truce, when orc clans gather for the Future Feast, the gathered hordes all come together over a three day period in order to partake in or spectate a wrestling tournament.
The tournament is a celebration of orcish physical feats and is put together by dedicated professional athletes. Its main point isn't to actually portray fighting, rather it is entertainment. In fact, many of the fights that are put on are recreations of historical fights which the orcs were involved in, as well as more fictional scenes commemorating a history which could have been, specifically around the collective trauma of the Cold.
History
The tournament's history is intertwined with that of the Future Feast in that it begun as the Orc Horde celebrated the victory at the Battle of Nine Stones, with the gathered orc fighters putting impromptu re-enactments of the battle and the skirmishes which had led up to it.
Throughout the Reckoning the Orc Horde stuck to this tradition and when it eventually disbanded into multiple orc clans, the clans still observed it as they did the Future Feast. The tournament slowly developped into an established event over three days of the yearly gathering in the hottest weeks of the summer, creating a new profession in orcish pro-wrestlers.
During the six-century long Cold, the orcs could not observe this tradition as they were subjugated by the Unliver but they returned to observing it yearly the summer that followed the Unliver's defeat and the renewed relative freedom of the orc clans.
To this day the orcs still observe this tradition though its focus is shifting away from celebrating orcish victories to attempting to provide orcish kind with catharsis over the collective generational trauma of the Cold by creating original fictional scenarios.
Execution
In the peak of the summer heat, when the Flood Road is at its highest, the orcs gather around Urgir to take part in this tradition.
The arena is a dip in the plains which extend westward towards the Flood Road, in the center of which occur the pre-determined fights which have been put together and choreographed by each wrestler involved in them.
The first day is still, even now, dedicated to recreation of the orcs' past, sometime spilling over into the following day's matches. As the natural progression traces these historical battles to the present or recent events, it evolves into more fictional wish fulfilling scenarios being enacted by the wrestlers.
A popular one being Belkzen Uelaz, the greatest orc hero and leader of the Orc Horde, returning millenia after his last appearance to defeat the Unliver or uniting the orcs against him, which is usually the closing act on the second day.
The wrestling actually also has a lot in common with theater with wrestlers casting themselves as historical figures to pay tribute to in their matches as opposed to inhabiting their own characters and creating their own kayfabe. However, despite the same events being recreated over this period, new wrestlers add their own concepts on how to execute the story best in a mock-fight for entertainment purposes which keep the presentation fresh.
On the third day, every wrestler who put on a show in the two days prior gets to rest and become part of the spectators in a wrestling tournament put on by other wrestlers who choreographed their matches over the last two days. The tournament is but a thinly veiled motivator to have feats of physicality on display with no coherence in the type of matches that occur. Some will be singles matches, others tag teams or elimination matches. Any excuse to put on a variety of shows inevitably leading to odd matchups in the latter stages of the tournament as the winner of a singles match may win to go face a tag team in a 1v2+ match or turning it into a triple threat match.
Components and tools
Wrestlers often prepare months in advance for a fight they're intending to partake in at the Tournament, creating costumes or crafting their own wrestling props.
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Related Ethnicities
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